Rain
by EbonyKittyCat552
Summary: Sometimes even Kanda needs a little bit of comforting in the aftermath of a traumatic experience - read warnings please


This is sorta a sequel to my fic Shame, because I can't torment Kanda forever *sigh*

I wouldn't call most of this fluffy, but the ending _is_ happy... I think anyway. I has my OC from Moonlight in it, just so you're all aware... He's kinda strange, but I can't help myself

Warning: implied rape with non-explicit details, slash content (no sex), angsting... I may have missed some stuff

Disclaimer: These people (cept Val) don't belong to me *pout* They belong to Katsura Hoshino

* * *

Most people thought he was heartless.

Kanda was not.

He simply chose to be less vocal—less open and vulnerable—about his emotions. He was not like that damned moyashi, whose emotions were clearly written on his face and in his huge silvery eyes. Nor was he like Lenalee, who cried over everything, probably even spilled milk if it suited her fancy. Komui was just an idiot most of the time, wearing that carefree expression to cover up the sad reality of the world, a delusion that served no purpose but to make everything more heart-wrenching in the end.

Truthfully, Kanda preferred to just accept it. It was easier, less of a shock to his system. He'd learned to accept things a very long time ago.

But this was hard to accept.

Standing on the edge of a cliff, he stared off into the darkness. He could hear waves crashing against the craggy rocks hundreds of feet below, but his eyes never wavered. He couldn't really see anything. The moon was obscured, and there was rain pouring down over him like a cold shower. He shivered.

Daisya's death had been a blow to them all, as had the other deaths of the other exorcists and finders. Tiedoll had taken Daisya's death particularly hard. The old man thought of all his apprentices as his sons, as if they were his own flesh and blood. Sometimes, Kanda was grateful for that, though he'd never admit it to Tiedoll or anyone else. It was nice to feel like _someone_ cared whether or not he came back from his next mission alive. His supposed "friends" probably wouldn't so much as shed a tear. Not that he'd blame them for that. The moyashi and baka usagi were not really his best friends in the whole world.

But this was… He almost wished that the goddamned Noah had just _killed him_. He hadn't, of course. _"What fun would that be?"_ he had said. Kanda's gut twisted sickeningly.

"You haven't told him yet," a soft, dreamy voice stated from just beyond his shoulder. Kanda didn't move at the sudden presence of his lover. He hadn't been able to so much as embrace the man since the incident, and he felt shamed by that fact. If it had been Val rejecting him, he would have thrown a tantrum by now and demanded an explanation.

Val had done neither of those things. He came each night and stood nearby. Kanda knew that he knew what had taken place, but his lover had never pushed.

"I…" Kanda tried to clear his mind, concentrating on the harsh sting of cold rain against his face, the way the icy droplets slipped beyond the collar of his coat and down his back. "I can't… Daisya… It's only been a few days since…"

"Yuu…" It was a warning tone, albeit a gentle one.

"How can I push this onto his conscience when he's mourning over the death of one of his apprentices?" Kanda asked bitterly, feeling more alone than ever. His arms rose around his sides in a one-sided embrace which did nothing to provide warmth or security to his shivering frame. "What right do I have to upset him right now with my useless problems? If I was _half_ the exorcist I'm supposed to be this would never have—"

"Don't even finish that sentence." For the first time in days, Val reached out to touch him, if only to turn him around, forcing him to face his lover's angry visage. Those winter blue eyes were, for once, sharp and very clear. "What makes you think that you should deny yourself comfort, Yuu? Are you too prideful to ask for it?"

"N-no, I—"

"Then _why?"_ Val asked, sounding almost desperate. "I know why you can't talk to me. You'll be ready eventually. But you need to talk to _someone_. I don't like it when you're like this…" He also sounded uncharacteristically worried. Val was usually a carefree individual with his head in the clouds so deeply that Kanda was frequently pulling him back to reality.

This time, it seemed, it was the other way around.

His lover leaned closer, the lose strands of silver hair that were pulled from his braid now stuck to his face and neck. His eyes were blazing. "Please, Yuu, just talk to him. He wouldn't like this any more than I do. He would want to help you."

"I don't need his help."

_Liar…_

"Please…"

Kanda closed his eyes, not wanting to fall into his lover's gaze or hear his pleading, sweet voice. His body was tense at the nearness of Val's presence.

_"It would simply be a waste to kill you… I can think of much more… enjoyable things to do with our time. What do you think, little exorcist? What shall we do with you?"_

It made him sick.

"Yuu…?"

"I just… can't," he whispered shamefully, looking back out into the blackness and feeling only the rain that soaked him from head to toe.

_"I know you have that lover of yours… nasty little exorcist that he is. I wonder what it is that he does to you. Well, I guess I don't _wonder_; I _know." Cold, high laughter.

Phantom fingers ghosted over his flesh, trailing downwards. Touches like that should have been pleasurable—they _were_ pleasurable, in a way—but they were so _cold_. They were foreign and wrong. Everything about it had been _wrong_.

_"Don't you like this, sweetheart? I know it feels good. Your body agrees with me."_

_No…_

"He wouldn't want you to do this to yourself," Val crooned. "You can't keep this bottled up, lover."

"He's not even my father. Why would I talk to him? Why would he even care?" Kanda knew he would, but he didn't think Val would know the extent of Tiedoll's affections. He had underestimated his lover's skills of observation, however.

"Don't play that game with me, Kanda Yuu. He _loves_ you, like his own son! Of course he would care!" Val sounded almost scandalized, and Kanda winced, knowing Val was a little tender about such subjects, having never had that same familial love before. He probably considered Kanda lucky. Kanda considered himself lucky, too.

But… Tiedoll was already upset over Daisya… He was hiding it rather well, but Kanda had known the man long enough to be able to see just how upset he was.

_He can get past the death of one of his surrogate brats by himself, but I can't get past this on my own. How pathetic._

Looking upwards, Kanda's eyelashes fluttered against the rain that splattered over his face. He wished it would just wash everything away. He wanted so very badly to forget that Noah, to forget Daisya's limp, crucified body, to forget the shivers that wracked his spine when talented fingers had touched all the right places, to forget how he had arched against a solid body and cried out in release. It all made him dizzy. His gut clenched in complete shame.

_How could I have enjoyed it? What kind of sick person am I, to enjoy being fucked right next to my fellow teammate's crucified corpse… by the enemy, no less?_

He didn't even realize that he was crying. The tears mingled so fully with the rain that it was impossible to tell the difference anyway, except that the water on his lips tasted slightly salty. A little hiccupping sob broke free from his throat before he held the rest back, choking sharply on it. A painful lump rose in his throat, swelling it shut. He felt as though he couldn't breathe.

"Lover…? You shouldn't do that, Yuu. You shouldn't hold it in." Val's voice was gentle and reassuring. "It's okay to cry, you know."

Not in Kanda's book, it wasn't! Crying equated to weakness and emotion. He didn't allow other people to see something so private, something that would make him so very vulnerable to them. Even Val had never seen him cry… until now.

Well… Tiedoll had, too…

Abruptly, he sat down in the wet sand, his legs suddenly feeling too weak to support to support his frame. _What kind of monster am I? Do I even have the right to cry? How could I enjoy that? Why couldn't he just have killed me?_

Questions buzzed through his head. He didn't even notice his lover crouching next to him where he knelt in the sand. Neither of them noticed the unseen onlooker a few feet away from them.

"Please, Yuu… talk to him. He's your father, or as close to one as you could possibly wish for. He needs to know about this, and you need his help." Val was still working to convince him, and small stroking hands through his wet hair had joined his hypnotizing voice. They didn't tug, but gently combed through the wet snarls. "At the very least do it for me and for him, if not for yourself… please?"

Tears boiled over, seeming to sizzle against his cheeks beside the icy sting of the rain washing them away. "I'll… try. I'll try."

A brush of lips against his cheek was the reply. It made him flinch slightly, but to his credit he did nothing more. His lover's gaze was infinitely sad as he pulled back. Inwardly, Kanda felt guilt like knives against his heart. _I'm hurting him, too, by doing this._

He needed to accept this. And if things kept going the way they were, he would never truly accept what had happened.

Suddenly, though, the rain felt mocking. Val stepped away from him, leaving him with only the water's cold embrace as he vanished into the thick downpour like a mirage. Sometimes, Kanda almost convinced himself that Val was nothing more than a figment of his imagination. Their physical encounters, however, had been far too real to be anything but corporeal.

Closing his eyes, he bowed his head. Val was hurt, too. He tried to imagine what it would be like to be unable to touch or kiss his lover, to be rejected over and over, even though he knew that the other hadn't meant the rejection. He would hate to see Val that way, too. He would feel the biting sting every time his lover flinched away from him as well. It must have been painful. Val had taken wounds that could kill a normal human without even batting an eyelash. He was strong.

"What am I supposed to do?" he asked aloud. His answer was just the constant beat of waves on the shore over the howling wind and the constant patter of rain that pelted down around him. At least the sand didn't turn to mud and ruin his uniform.

Hopelessness flooded him. Pain burned under his skin, melted through his blood. Every place those dark hands had touched him felt like it had been lit aflame. His eyes stung with more tears, an unceasing flood of them that he couldn't hold at bay no matter how hard he tried. And he was alone. He had driven his lover off.

"Help…" he called softly, staring into the darkness, willing Val to return to him, though he knew his lover was long gone already. "Please… Help me…"

He couldn't even muster the strength to stand. Sobs shook his whole body, and the rain only seemed to push him down even more. It was not cleansing. It felt more like unforgiving knives stabbing into his flesh.

"Please…" Helplessly, he ran his gloved hands through his lose hair, tugging at the ends almost wildly. "Somebody…?"

_"Come for me, beautiful. I want to see your pretty face the way _he_ does. It's not fair that you hide it and give so exclusively."_ Cold hands burned their way down his frame. Logically, he knew they weren't there, but his eyes were wide with terror. _"There, there, now… There…"_

"No…" He shook his head frantically, curling up in a tight ball. "No, no, no…"

"Yuu-kun?" It was so soft that at first he didn't hear it at all over the rain and the heavy beating of his heart against his eardrums. "Yuu-kun, what are you doing out here? You'll catch a cold like this…"

Gentle hands wrapped around his shoulders. "Yuu-kun…?"

"I'm sorry," he sobbed. "I'm sorry."

"Now hush." Though the rain did quite a good job of mixing with his tears and washing them down his face, he still felt calloused artisan fingers sweeping over the soft, high rises of his cheeks. "You don't have anything to be sorry for, Yuu-kun."

"But I do! I… I…" Kanda would later be ashamed to admit how he clung to his mentor's shirt and jacket like a young child. At the moment, though, he couldn't bring himself to care much. "I _should be_. I should!"

"Now, why would you think something like that, hm?" the old man asked, sitting cross-legged with Kanda practically in his lap. He didn't seem to mind though, nor did he seem to mind that the rain splashed all over his glasses. There was no way he could have been able to see anything through them like that.

"Because… Daisya…"

"_You_ didn't kill him, did you?" It was rhetorical question. "There's nothing you could've done, I'm afraid."

"N-no, not… not _that_," he stammered. It wasn't Daisya's _death_ that bothered him so. He and Daisya had never been close to one another, had never been anything even remotely resembling friends, let alone brothers, but… they were still comrades. And comrades didn't… they didn't…

Sobbing so hard he could barely breathe, Kanda told him everything. _Everything_.

He told his mentor about finding the body. He told about the Noah, about confronting him and threatening him. He told about being captured, about how _weak_ and _useless_ he was. He told him what the Noah had done. All of it.

And then… he felt low. He felt so disgusting. He couldn't even look up at the man. He didn't feel fit to even be in the presence of an accommodator of _Innocence_.

"I'm… I'm…" _I'm sick… disgusting. Tell me what I am, master._

The arms around him tightened. For one instant, Kanda imagined that Tiedoll would strangle him. It would be no less than he deserved. But the general did no such thing. Kanda gasped, finding himself pulled up against a surprisingly hard, broad chest.

"Shhh…" the older man crooned. "It's okay, little one… It's not your fault." It was what he needed to hear, but Kanda couldn't let himself be lulled so easily. He lay tense in his former-master's arms, listening to his heart beating very steadily. "Listen to me, Yuu-kun. You didn't ask for that, did you?"

"No!" he exclaimed immediately, clenching his eyes shut.

"You didn't want that."

"N-n-no…" he moaned out, falling limp, shaking his head. He hadn't asked for—hadn't _wanted_—any of it.

"Then it's not your fault, is it?"

"B-but…"

"It's not your fault, Yuu-kun." The hand that stroked down his back should have frightened him, should have sent him skittering away like a shy animal. But it felt nice. It felt… comforting.

"It's not… my fault…" He could barely force the words out. _Accept it… accept it…_

"It is not."

Taking a few more deep breaths, Kanda once against burst into tears, collapsing against his current pillar of strength. Only this time the tears didn't burn his skin. The rain sliding down the back of his neck didn't feel like the Noah's cold fingers anymore.

It felt clean… pure.

"It's okay, Yuu-kun…"

Suddenly the rain no longer felt mocking. It didn't wash away the memories, didn't make him forget, but neither did it make him remember. The chill faded away, leaving him feeling rather… light. Nervously, he peeked up into his mentor's glasses. He found no loathing there, nor disgust.

"Come on… let's get some rest. We'll be moving on again tomorrow." Warm hands gripped his, helping him stand on his shaky legs. At least they no longer felt like jelly.

He glanced back at the ocean once more, but he reveled in the droplets of cold water that washed over his face. Instead of imagining the Noah's unwanted touch, he could almost feel his lover's fingers on his skin, wiping all his tears away. It, too, was comforting.

Kanda Yuu was the kind of person who accepted reality, but sometimes… maybe… he needed a little bit of help, too.

* * *

Well, there we go... poor Kanda, I love to pick on him entirely too much, but at least it's got a happy-ish ending

Review if you wish to


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